Every Day is WDsD
My Facebook feed has been blowing up over the past 24 hours with all kinds of videos, images and well wishes from our community. It started last night with a video from a family that has been walking alongside us – then a text message from the principal of Julia’s school telling all of the […]
Christmas Greetings from the Farm
It’s Christmas Eve at the farm on Willow Road; and like a large part of the Midwest, we’re experiencing an unexpected heat wave. With the last several days of unseasonable warmth, I’m pretty sure the newly planted wheat crop doesn’t know what to do. After a blustery night of rain, the clouds broke and the […]
World Down Syndrome Day ~ One More Voice
Four World Down Syndrome Days have passed in my daughter’s life, and this will be the third one I’ve written about. I missed the first one because it was only a couple of months after her heart surgery when we were still taking in how marvelously normal things were becoming. A lot has happened since […]
A Pre-Thanksgiving Giving of Thanks
We’re coming into the season where we all take an intentional look back at the year and our lives and practice the life-giving discipline of gratitude. Many of you have been following our little family’s adventure faithfully for over three years now, so let me say right at the outset that we are very, very […]
An Open Letter to Julia on Her First Day of Preschool
Editor’s note: As strange as this might seem, Julia’s formal educational career starts today at the three year old preschool class at our local elementary school. I’ve been anticipating and dreading this day for the entire summer, especially in the light of the wrangling we have been in with the special education department of our […]
Working + Waiting = Mobile!
As a parent of a kid with Down syndrome (or any special need, for that matter), you find yourself never taking anything for granted. Sure, it can get frustrating watching your kid’s typical friends seemingly breeze through crawling and standing and walking and learning new words as yours is still figuring out the intricacies of […]
World Down Syndrome Day Plus One Week – Now What?
Let me just get this out there right now. I had a really rough time adjusting my attitude last night as I put Julia to bed. I’m not sure if it was the last of the stomach bug she’s been dealing with or the contrarianism that her whimsical toddler brain has developed, but let’s just […]
Fulfilled…
The past few weeks have seen the fulfillment of a longtime dream for Jocelyn and I. You may remember over a year ago as I was thinking through the emotion of watching Julia’s Down syndrome becoming a little more evident and younger kids passing her by developmentally. Well… it’s been over a year and a […]
Dancing On
The summer is nearly at an end, and we took in the waning hours of the Labor Day weekend with an art show and parade in nearby Franklin and some well deserved afternoon napping. Julia has been down for over two hours; and though she needs the rest, it’s always hard not to dread the […]
A Year (and a Lifetime) Ago
Tonight I was reminded again that sometimes in the crush of the day to day, I need to remember to sit and be grateful every now and again. It started innocently enough. I was dealing with a typical “first world” problem and rearranging some stuff in our refrigerator so that I could somehow wedge more […]